1 in 7 are absent from work for four weeks or more

This suggests that four week long absences are more common than the 1 in 18 risk reported by UK government earlier this month. Ellipse had surveyed 1,005 UK SME employees.  Lee Lovett, CEO of Ellipse, said: "Our research shows that long term absences occur at a more alarming rate than national statistics would suggest. For an SME made up of seven people this presents a very real risk that they will have to deal with a long-term absence every year. "We therefore need to convince the 21% of SME managers who believe their business is too small to worry about absence that this is not the ...